Method of automatically selecting multimedia files for transfer between two storage mediums

ABSTRACT

A method of automatically selecting at least one of stored multimedia files for transfer between a first storage medium and a second storage medium. In the method, each stored file is assigned a popularity weighting based on popularity information and files are selected that have a popularity weighting within a preferred range.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The current invention related to personal audio equipment and to portable media players and media centers. More particularly the invention relates to a method of automatically selecting multimedia files for transfer between two storage mediums.

BACKGROUND TO THE INVENTION

The widespread use of the Internet as a distribution channel for multimedia data and the advancement in storage technology enable users to have a very large collection of multimedia files. It is not uncommon for a user to have hundreds or even thousands of files stored in the hard drive of a personal computer (PC). The growing of the already very large collection of multimedia files increases the difficulty of accessing the desirable file.

The storage capacity of portable media players is usually much smaller than the storage capacity of a PC. Therefore it is impossible for a user to transfer their whole collection of multimedia files from the PC to a portable unit. The user must select a small portion from the large collection. This becomes increasingly difficulty as the collection grows.

The time required to transfer multimedia files from a PC to a portable unit can take minutes to hours depending on the capacity of the portable unit. As there is a trend in increasing capacity of the portable unit, the time required to fill-up the portable unit with multimedia content will increase. Therefore, it will be a waste of time and create inconvenience to the user if the transferred multimedia content is not the desirable one.

Currently, media player software only allows users to assemble ‘playlists’ based on a targeted range of capacity. This requires the user to be aware of the remaining capacity of the portable device. Some software allows a selection based on the popularity, source or last access time. However, their implementation is a manual process and requires the attention from users. For example, the user has to recall from his memory whether the most frequently or recently accessed media files are desirable. In short, the current approach requires the attention and active participation of the users to select the desirable content.

OBJECT OF THE INVENTION

It is an object of the present invention to overcome or substantially ameliorate at least one of the above disadvantages and/or more generally to provide an automatic method for selecting multimedia files for transfer between two storage mediums, and in particular from a PC to a media center or from a PC to a portable media player or from a media center to a portable media player.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

Broadly, there is disclosed herein a media center/portable media player with means for automatically updating multimedia files, in particular audio tracks, between a master repository in the media center and the portable player based on various “popularity” criteria. The media center could be either a home entertainment system or a software application running on a PC. The master repository is on either the computer hard drive or the hard drive of the home entertainment system. When the portable media player is connected to the computer or home entertainment system via a USB cable, or comes within range of a wireless connection such as Bluetooth, an automated updating routine is initiated to check for spare space on the portable media player and to automatically update or replace multimedia files according to the “popularity” criteria.

According to the invention there is provided a method of automatically selecting one or more of a plurality of stored multimedia files for transfer between a first storage medium and a second storage medium comprising assigning each stored file a popularity weighting based on popularity information and selecting from among the files those files having a popularity weighting within a preferred range.

The invention also provides a method of selecting from among weighted multimedia files in the second storage medium files to remove from the second storage medium, and a method of selecting from among a plurality of multimedia files stored on the storage mediums two or more groups of files based on two or more different selection criteria.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

A preferred form of the present invention will now be described by way of example with reference to the accompanying drawings, wherein:

FIG. 1 is a schematic illustration of a portable media player,

FIG. 2 is a schematic illustration of a media center,

FIG. 3 is a schematic illustration of possible configurations of a PC, media center and portable media player interconnection,

FIG. 4 is a flow chart for initial connection of the portable media player to media center,

FIG. 5 represents a database of multimedia file characteristics,

FIG. 6 is a schematic illustration of one embodiment of a selection process according to the invention, and

FIG. 7 is a flow chart of the selection process of the embodiment of FIG. 6.

DESCRIPTION OF INVENTION

In the preferred embodiment of the invention the method manages and selects audio tracks for use in portable personal audio players. In FIGS. 1 and 2 there is depicted a typical multimedia hardware arrangement. The media center comprises a housing, an amplifier, a display, a digital signal processor, a storage element, external output interfaces, buttons, a USB host for connecting a portable media player, and a USB device for connecting a PC. The portable media player comprises a housing, a headphone amplifier, a display, a digital signal processor, a storage element, buttons, and a USB device for connecting to the media center or a PC.

The storage mediums of the media center and portable media player store the multimedia files and also store a database for recording characteristic data of the multimedia files such as Album, Artist, Genre, Song Title, Publication Year, song duration (length) and a played/accessed duration of the actual length of time of each instance of the file played. An example of the database is shown in FIG. 5. With this database various statistics can be generated. Most importantly, the database shows the user's listening preference. For example, from that database of FIG. 5 it can be observed that user dislike the first and last tracks as they skip over these files fairly quickly each time.

FIG. 3 shows all possible connections of the computer, media center and portable media player. It is possible for the computer to exchange files with the media center; the media center to exchange files with portable media player and the computer to exchange files with the portable media player.

In the media center, the multimedia management software will automatically sense the residual capacity of the portable media player. It will also determine if the database exist in the portable media player or not. If there is no database in the portable media player the media center will use its own database to generate the statistic of the album, artist, genre, year, songs, etc. If the database exists in the portable media player, it will use the database on the portable media player to generate the statistics. See FIG. 4.

In one embodiment of the invention, a database for recording the played duration (access time) of a song is implemented. The database is used to generate popularity information for each track characteristic of artist, album, genre, year and song name according to the played duration of the files. The information is calculated from that database statistics using the following equation: ${P(i)} = {\sum\limits_{\{{j❘{j \in {S{(i)}}}}\}}\left\lbrack \frac{{played}\quad{duration}\quad{of}\quad{{track}(j)}}{{duration}\quad{of}\quad{{track}(j)}} \right\rbrack}$ where i is the artist, album, genre, year or song name as the case may be and S(i) is a set comprising all tracks of having the common artist, album, genre, year or song name.

The database also stores information on the last, say 5, plays of the track. These previous played durations are used to compute a last-play weight of the tracks using the following equation: $\sum\limits_{j = 1}^{5}{l_{j} \times t}$ where l is a coefficient for the j^(th) play of the audio track such that l_(j)>l_(j+l) and t is $\left\lbrack \frac{{duration}\quad{of}\quad{the}\quad j^{th}\quad{play}\quad{of}\quad{the}\quad{track}}{{duration}\quad{of}\quad{the}\quad{track}} \right\rbrack$ or 1 if the track has not been played before.

The coefficient l_(j) is set such that the most recently played time counts most. That is, if the user played a track in full a first time, but skipped through it on the subsequent 4 plays the weight of the track will be low.

The popularity information from each of the artist, album, genre, year and song title characteristics and the last-play weight are then used to compute a track weighting to be applied to the track.

The track weighting is determined using the following equation: $\left\lbrack {\sum\limits_{\{{{P{(i)}}❘{{P{(i)}} \in I}}\}}{{K(i)} \times {P(i)}}} \right\rbrack \times {T(i)}$ where i is the artist, album, genre, year or song name as the case may be; I is a set comprising the one or more of track song, track artist, track album, track genre and track year; K is a weighting constant; P is the listener's preference and T is the last-play duration.

The rationale behind this equation is that if the user like a lot of songs of, say, artist 1, then the popularity information of all tracks by artist 1 will increase. But, if the user dislike a particular song by that artist and skips over it again and again, this factor will be reflected in the last-play weighting which will lower the overall track weighting for that particular track.

In one embodiment, the automated system simply selects the top weighted tracks for transfer to fill-up the sensed residual capacity of the portable media player.

FIGS. 6 and 7 illustrate a selection process of an alternative embodiment of the invention. Several smaller collections are selected base on criteria like shuffle, random, weighted popularity and recent addition. The selections are then further shrunk down based on the available capacity and the songs to be replaced in the portable unit. The sensed residual capacity of the portable media player is divided between four selection groups and Ni songs from each group are selected to put on the portable media player.

To provide additional space in the portable unit and ensure only the most popular files are stored on it a replacement scheme is performed by comparing the weighted popularity of the whole collection in the media center against the weighted popularity of the collection in the portable unit. If the weighted popularity of a track on the portable media player is less than a certain amount of the mean weighted popularity, then the track will be removed from the portable media player to free up space for the new selection.

Advantages of the current invention are that it automatically sense the residual capacity of the receiving unit and selects multimedia files to be transfer without attention from user. The invention can also facilitate the automatic replacement of unpopular songs in the receiving unit without attention from user.

The invention provides a method that, among other things, computes the popularity of a song using the number of times the song was played, computes the popularity of a song based on whether the whole song was played or just part of the song was played, computes the popularity of an artist or album or genre based on the popularity of all songs of that artist or album or genre.

As the database is continually being updated as the user listens to the tracks the method is adaptive to the user's changing behaviour and the weighted popularity of tracks will adjust according to the user's preference on a daily bases.

It should be appreciate those modifications and alternations obvious to those skilled in the art are not to be considered as beyond the scope of the present invention. For example the invention can allow bi-directional music transfer as indicated as media center in FIG. 3. The invention is particularly applicable to audio files but can be used to manage video, still image, text and other media files. 

1. A method of automatically selecting at least one of a plurality of stored multimedia files for transfer between a first storage medium and a second storage medium, the method comprising assigning each stored file a popularity weighting based on popularity information and selecting from among the plurality of stored files those files having a popularity weighting within a preferred range.
 2. The method of claim 1 wherein the popularity information includes user's preference for at least one of file name, file artist, file album, file genre, and publication year.
 3. The method of claim 2 wherein the popularity information is based on duration of access of the stored file.
 4. The method of claim 2 wherein the user's preference is defined as ${P(i)} = {\sum\limits_{\{{j❘{j \in {S{(i)}}}}\}}\left\lbrack \frac{{duration}\quad{of}\quad{access}\quad{of}\quad{{file}(j)}}{{{duration}/{length}}\quad{of}\quad{{file}(j)}} \right\rbrack}$ where i is the file name, the file artist, the file album, the file genre, and the publication year, and S(i) is a set comprising all files of i.
 5. The method of claim 4 wherein track weighting is $\sum\limits_{\{{{P{(i)}}❘{{P{(i)}} \in I}}\}}{{K(i)} \times {P(i)}}$ where I is a set comprising at least one of the file name, the file artist, the file album, the file genre, and the publication year, and K is a weighting constant.
 6. The method of claim 2 wherein the popularity information also includes a last-accessed duration of the file.
 7. The method of claim 6 wherein the last-accessed duration is defined as: $\sum\limits_{j = 1}^{5}{l_{j} \times t}$ where l is a coefficient for the j^(th) access of the file such that l_(j)>l_(j+1) and $\left\lbrack \frac{{duration}\quad{of}\quad{the}\quad j^{th}\quad{access}\quad{of}\quad{the}\quad{file}}{{{duration}/{length}}\quad{of}\quad{the}\quad{file}} \right\rbrack$ or 1 if the file has not been accessed before.
 8. The method of claim 6 wherein the popularity weighting is defined as $\left\lbrack {\sum\limits_{\{{{P{(i)}}❘{{P{(i)}} \in I}}\}}{{K(i)} \times {P(i)}}} \right\rbrack \times {T(i)}$ where i is the file name, the file artist, the file album, the file genre, and the publication year, I is a set comprising the at least one of the file name, the file artist, the file album, the file genre, and the publication year, K is a weighting constant, P is the user's preference, and T is the last-accessed duration.
 9. A method of automatically selecting at least one of a plurality of stored audio tracks for transfer between a main storage memory and a portable storage memory, the method comprising: determining amount of available storage space in a portable storage memory, assigning to each stored audio track in a main memory a track weighting based on popularity information, and selecting from among the audio tracks weighted a selection of audio tracks having a preferred track weighting for transfer to the portable storage memory such that the tracks selected fill the amount of available storage space.
 10. The method of claim 9 wherein the popularity information comprises listener's preference for at least two of track song, track artist, track album, track genre, and track year, based on played duration of the stored audio track.
 11. The method of claim 9 further comprising providing in one of the storage memories a database comprising the popularity information of the stored audio tracks.
 12. The method of claim 11 wherein the database includes track song, track artist, track album, track genre, track year, played duration and duration for each of the stored audio tracks.
 13. The method of claim 11 wherein the database is in the portable storage memory.
 14. The method of claim 9 further comprising assigning to each stored audio track in the portable memory a track weighting based on the popularity information, and selecting from among the audio tracks weighted in the portable storage memory a selection of tracks to remove from the portable storage memory.
 15. The method of claim 14 wherein the selection of tracks to remove from the portable storage memory comprises all tracks having a least-preferred track weighting.
 16. The method of claim 15 wherein the least-preferred track weighting is below a mean of the track weightings of all stored audio tracks.
 17. A method of automatically selecting at least one of a plurality of stored audio tracks for transfer between a main storage memory and a portable storage memory, the method comprising: determining an amount of available memory in a portable storage memory, dividing the amount of available memory into at least two memory allocations, and selecting from among a plurality of audio tracks stored in a main storage memory at least two groups of audio tracks for transfer to the portable storage memory such that the groups of tracks fill respective memory allocations.
 18. The method of claim 17 wherein the at least two groups of audio tracks are selected according to respective selection criteria comprising at least two of: most popular tracks based on track weighting, most recently selected tracks in at least one previous selection, tracks not previous selected in at least one previous selection, and randomly selected tracks.
 19. The method of claim 17 further comprising initially assigning to each stored audio track in both the main memory and the portable memory a track weighting based on popularity information, and removing from the portable storage memory tracks having a least-preferred track weighting.
 20. The method of claim 19 wherein the least-preferred track weighting is below a mean of all track weightings. 